Electronic Arts returns to the N64 with its second
wrestling game. This game is a bit different from others,
apparently EAs last N64 wrestling outing, WCW Mayhem, was
the first wrestling game to feature Backstage Brawling, and it
was a hit with wrestling gamers everywhere who were dying for
something new in the wrestling genre. And I guess EA liked the
whole Backstage part of the last game so much, that it decided to
make the sequel just Backstage Brawling, period. This game also
happens to be Electronic Arts last game on the N64,
succeeding TWINE: 007 by a few weeks. Will this new approach to
the genre satisfy the fans, and go make EA Games go out with a
bang on the N64 with its last game? Lets get onto the
review and find out.

Graphics

The Backstage areas in the game look great and well drawn out.
You got every kind of area in an arena you can think of like
Locker Rooms, Trucking Areas, Media Rooms, and even Bathrooms.
They all look great and the developers at Kodiak did a good job
at creating the most realistic environments out there. The
environments are even interactive, like you can rip off the
urinal off the bathroom wall and use it as a weapon, or grab a
computer from a desk and knock your opponent off with it. You can
even climb up on crates and desks, like a turnbuckle in a ring,
and give elbow drops and flying splashes on the opponent on the
ground.

The animation is really good for most of the moves, and it
looks surprisingly more realistic than the moves in WWF No Mercy.
The menu screens are nicely laid out and easy to browse through,
however, I must say the character select screen is a little
confusing at first. The game does have a couple of camera
problems in multi player, where if the wrestlers move to far
apart from each other, you get this awkward overhead view, which
is really hard to maneuver around with. Also, I was disappointed
there was no entrances for the wrestlers in the game either. The
wrestlers are, nice, big and polygonal, but theres just one
problem, and that is their faces and costumes are drawn out very
poorly, and about 80% of the real wrestlers costumes and faces
look nothing like their real life counterparts. But on the bright
side, loading times are just a couple of seconds long before a
match (you dont even notice them at first any ways). So the
visuals have their ups and downs.

Sound

The game has mostly geriatric electric guitar music for
its background stuff, and doesnt sound all that bad.
Since there are no entrances for the wrestlers, you would think
there would be no entrance themes, right? Well, after a match,
the victor stands around and poses for about 20-30 seconds while
the announcers say how good a match it was, and during that time,
some music plays, its usually that guitar music, but for about 10
popular wrestlers, it plays their themes, like Goldbergs
Invasion theme, and Nashs Wolfpac theme. Sound
effects are pretty good, with most of the kicks and grunts all
sounding appropriate. The best part about the sound, however, is
the nice smooth running line of commentary from Tony Schivane,
and Bobby The Brain Heenan. Not only do they call out
practically every move in the game, but they also throw in their
own lines of commentary throughout the match, and even though it
repeats on occasion, youll never get tired of hearing the
Brain say, All the wrestlers want to hear is Gene Okerlund
announcing them the winner after the match! The opening
intro of the game where Schivane is going insane is also a nice
touch.

Game play

The controls are really not that bad. The default controls are
much like the No Mercy set. You move with the control pad,
grapple with B, strong punch or kick with A, and do weak chops
and change focus with the C buttons. When in a grapple press a
direction and the A, Bottom C, or Left C button at the same time
to do a move. You do signature moves when your momentum meter is
maxed out, which happens to frequently in my opinion, by getting
in a grapple and wiggling the joystick, the exact same way in
THQs games. The collision detection is still a little
shoddy from Mayhem, but not as bad or shoddy. The only problems I
have with the controls, is that at times, I have problems moving
around a fallen opponent.

There is no ring at all in the game, which makes me wonder why
the heck did Kodiak leave it out? So the game is set throughout
an interactive backstage environment, where you can enter and
exit certain parts of the arena, and score victories anywhere, by
pin, submission, knockout, or under the special stipulations of
first blood and torch. Another new interesting concept added in
the game is when you nail an opponent with the same weapon 5 or 6
times, it shatters, dont worry about running out of
weapons, because theres loads of them and you can always go
into a different area for more. Theres also a new
shock part in the game where if you use a weapon and
hit the weapon out of the hands of another wrestler, you
temporarily shock them. And you can also throw
weapons at each other like in No Mercy as well.

For game modes, we got exhibition, which is a basic one-on-one
match up. In exhibition you can have regular matches, than a
special First Blood match, where whoever draws blood first is the
loser of the match, and an interesting Human Torch match, where
you light a 2x4 on fire from a burning barrel, and whack it on
your opponent to light them on fire, and making them lose the
match. Those are your only multi player modes, and unfortunately,
they are just for two players only. We got two main single player
modes, Hardcore Gauntlet, where you try to beat up to 7 opponents
with just one wrestler. And Hardcore Challenge, where you move up
the ranks and win the Hardcore, US, and World Titles. In both
modes you can unlock new costumes, moves, and wrestlers.

Replay Value

The game only has 25 characters at the beginning of the game,
and theres about another 30 that need to be unlocked, with
the addition of plenty of extra moves and costumes needing to be
unlocked as well, so youll be playing the single player
modes for a long time. The game also has a create a wrestler,
which is way better than the one featured in Mayhem. Lots of
depth here, but for some dumb reason, you have to buy
moves to add in your repertoire by getting points in the main
single player mode. Too bad the game can only be played by up to
two players only. This is the first, and last N64 wrestler to do
that. And theres not enough other multi player modes to
keep you occupied either. Why the hell is there not a tag match
in here? Also some type of Cage Match and Battle Royal Matches
wouldve been appreciated.

In Brief

+: The best animation of most of the wrestling games out
there, lots of wrestlers to unlock, battling backstage is pretty
fun, some of the best commentary of all the N64 wrestlers

-: Poor drawn out designs of the wrestlers, only up to 2
players can play, no ring at all in the game, no special tag
team, cage, or battle royal matches

The Final Ratings Rundown

Graphics: 7.5
Sound: 9.0
Game play: 5.3
Replay Value: 4.1

Overall: 6.4

Rounded to fit GameFAQs Score: 6

Comments

Well, this game has many ups and downs, but the game
wasnt as bad as I thought it would be in the first place.
The game play is actually quite good, but only if the game
couldve had some in ring wrestling and a lot more modes,
then this game couldve been great. I strongly suggest
renting this game first, or buy it if you see it in the bargain
bin.